Needle control mechanism for knitting machines



W 1933 w. D. BUTZZ ma ma NEEDLE CONTROL MECHANISM FOR KNITTING MACHINES Filed Feb. 1, 1929 2 sheets-shew 1 WITNESSES IN V EN TOR- W a A TTORNEYS.

Aug H 1931. w. D. BUTZ I 1,518,113

NEEDLE CONTROL MECHANISM FOR KNITTING MACHINES Filed Feb. 1, 1929 2 ShGBtS-Sh$5 2 INVENTOR: wzllierflliuig BY W ATTORNEYS.

aiiiififw WW Patented Aug. 11, 1931 so STATES PATENT eerie WALTEB D. Burner nonnrs'rown, PENNSYLVANIA, essron'on on ONE-,HALE To "Louis n. n. WILLIAMS, or ELKINS PARK, PENNSYLVANIA NEEDLECONTRQL vMECHANISM FOR KNITTING MACHINES Application filed February This. invention relates to mechanism for controlling the needles of knitting machines to produce ornamental and other effects, moreparticularly incidental to fashioning operations, for example: during knitting of heel and toev pockets of seamless stockings to form along, the diagonal fashioning sutures characteristic of such hosiery, parallel lines of tuck stitches.

0? The main objects. of my .present invention are to enable accomplishment of opera-.

tions, of the kind referredto, automatically upon standard knitting machines; and to attain this desideratum through provision "'25 seamless stockinghaving its toe modified with the aid of my novel needle. control mechanism.

Fig. II is a diagrammatic Viewillustrating the development of the stocking toe. V

Fig. III shows the plan view of the cam ring of a typical seamless hosiery knitting machine equipped with my. needle control mechanism.

Fig. IV is a linear development of the cam ring showingthe operative relation of the needles and the cams during widening of the toe pocket, and the manner in which predetermined needles are controlled for tucking in accordance with my invention.

' Figs. V, VI and VII, are fragmentary diagrammatic views, similar to Fig. IV,

showing succeeding steps incident to the controlof predetermined tucking needles.

The stocking partly depicted in Fig.1

will be observed as of the kind ordinarily made on circular knitting machines, that is to say: it is knit tubular throughout and has heel and toe pockets H, T with the diagonal fashioning sutures S Scharacten istic of seamless hosiery. A distinction 'will 1, 1929. Serial No. 336,686.

however be noted in that the toe T of the stocking, at oppositedsides, has lines of demarcation L which are co-extensive with, and lie parallel to the diagonal fashioning sutures S, the effect being produced by tucking upon selected needles at a predetermined distance from changing end needles during fashioningin this instance during widening of the toev pocket T. ,F or a clearer understanding of the toe pocket formation, I have diagrammaticall'y ,illusT trated in F ig. II the result of the ,successive narrowing and widening phases of the knitting, the lines of tuck stitches being designated by the letter L as before.

Referring now to Figs. III and IV, the numeral 10 comprehensively designates the cam ring of a typical seamless stocking knitting machine known commercially as a Scott & Villiams machine andmanufaotured under U. S. Letters Patent No. 1,152,850 granted to Robert IV. Scott on September 7, 1915, said ring being, fitted with left and right stitch drawing cams 11, 12, top and bottom center cams 13,14, side cams 15,16, a pair of lifting pickers 17, 18 and a dcpressing picker 19,,as well as with a switch cam 20. This switch cam 20 is swingable up and down into positions on the one hand to raise the long butt needles-indicated by the heavy lines N in Fig. IV.-to enable fashioning of the heel and toe pockets H and T, respectively, by the short butt needles indicated bythe light lines Nand on theother hand to restore said long butt needles N to activityat the completion of said heel and toe pockets. he lifting pickers 17, 18 are swivelly mounted as usual for capacity to swing horizontally, and subject to guidance by fixed cams 21, 22 i'g. III) which determine upward movement at an inclination and raising of short butt needles N sn cessively from the active to the idle level for fashioning purposes, during reciprocatoryknitting, in a manner well understood in this art. The lifting pickers l7, 18 are moreover connected for coordinated operation by meansjof a link. 23.1(Fig. III) as in the Scott patent supra. The depressing picker 19 is also of successive fabric courses.

said lifting pickers 17, 18, the an:

lever.

just broad enough 10 parallelism with the sutures S, one or more of the needles at a predeterminedly uniform distance from the changing opposite L id. needles of the active group must be arsenately removed from action during kni This oilice I relegate to a pair of auxiliary pickers whirh are indicated by the numerals 2 5, 26 in im III-V and shown as associated respectively with the usual lifting pickers 17, 18. l

lifting pickers 25, 26 are swivelly mounted (Fig. III) and likewise guided durin horizontal swinging by statioi'iary c; in elevating needles from the active to idle The shank ends of the auxiliary pickers 25, 26 are however shaped differently from thoseof the regular pickers 17, 1.8, that is to say, they are substantially square in configuration, and, in the present instance, 7 to engage one needle at a time. Normally the auxiliary pickers 27 26 are under-travelled by the butts of all the needles N, N; but during widening of the stocking toe the short butt needles N are slightly elevated as they approach the stitch cams 11, 12 from opposite directions ,7 bya pair of vertically slidable supplemental lifting 1151111529, 30 so that said needles then travel above the auxiliary pickers 25, 26 as shown in Fig. IV. Any suitable means may be employed to slide the cams 29, 30 into operative position in timed relation with coordinated functionings of the knitting cycle. Lifting action of the auxiliary pickers 25, 26 is brought about as a consetpiencc of being directly connected to the usual lifting pickers l7, 18 by means of links 31, see Fig. III.

The operation of my invention is as follows fLet it be assumed that'the'stoeking has been knit down through the leg, heel, foot and the narrowed part of the toe to the line a; g in Fig. II, and that widening for the completion of the toe is about to commence. At this time the drop picker 19 is released in preparation for the widening and the supplemental lifting cams 29, 3O raised to the position of Fig. IV. As the needle cylinder of the machine travels in 59 the direction of the arrow in the latter figure, it will be seen that the active subdivision of the short butt needles N will be raised slightly by the cam 29 so as to travel above the auxiliary picker 25. As the leading right hand end needle 33 of the active group encounters the lifting picker 17, it will carry the latter along and will be at the same time lifted to the inactive position in the known manner. Concurrently with this action it will be observed that the auxiliary lifting picker 25 is pulled along, and, as a consequence of its connection 31 with the picker 17, engages beneath a needle 3 f further along in the active group and this selected needle 34: will consequently be raised to the inactive or tucking level together with the leading needle 38 as illustrated in Fig. V. With continued advance of the needle cylinder in the direction indicated, the needle 34: raised by the auxiliary picker 25 will. obviously pass, with the idle needles, over the top of the knitting cams at the tucking level, while the other active needles follow the course prescribed by the knitting cams to form fabric loops. As the cylinder completes its movement in the indicated direction, the depressing picker l9 rises through the gap in the idle needles in readiness to arrest the tucking needle 3a previously raised by the auxiliary picker 25 as shown in Fig. VI, whereupon, after the movement of the cylinder is completed, said needle 34 will be again restored to the active group. lVith initiation of the succeeding reversal in the movement of the needle cylinder, the depressing picker 19 will operate in the usual way to engage the leading left hand end pair 35 of the idle group of needles to restore them to activity for widening; and as the cylinder movement continues, the other auxiliary picker 26 will obviously function to elevate a needle at a corresponding predetermined distance from the leading left hand end needle 36 of the active group to raise said selected needle precisely as described in connection with the auxiliary picker 25. Thus, for each course of reciprocatory knitting during the widening phase, a needle at a predetermined dis tance from the end needles of the active series is thrown out of action first at one side and then at the other, and, after having passed over the knitting cams at tucking level, is again restored to action. As a result of so temper y idlin selected neighboring needles within the ranks of the active needles, it follows that tuck stitches are produced along lines parallel with the fashioning sutures S. Upon completion of the stocking toe, the supplemental lifting cams 29, 30 are again withdrawn so as to be out of the way during ordinary round and round knitting. If desired, the auxiliary lifting pickers 25, 26 may be widened or proportioned to act upon more than one needle at a time with production of correspondingly heavier tucks. Also if desired, similar lines of tuck stitches may obviously be formed at opposite sides of the heel pocket II in parallelism with the sutures S, by

simply throwing into action the auxiliary pickers 25, 26 during the Widening opera tion incident to heel pocket formation.

From the foregoing it Will be seen that the needle control mechanism of my invention is simple, inexpensive and readily a plied to standard knitting machines Wit1- out entailing prohibitive alteration in their construction nor interferring with their normal mode of operation, so that stockings With heel and toe pockets modified as described, may be produced as rapidly and as economically as ordinary seamless stockings.

My invention is of course not to be construed as limited to stocking knitting machines since it may be incorporated in other instances Where fashioning operations are carried out by removing and adding end needles.

Having thus described my invention, 1 claim 1. The combination With knitting ma chines equipped with a series of needles and instrumentalities for removing and adding end needles to fashion the Web incidental to reciprocatory knitting, of auxiliary needle control mechanism embodying means subject to governance by the end needles to select needles alternately at a predetermined distance from opposite end needles for special action during knitting of current courses of the fabric.

2. The combination With knitting machines equipped with instrumentalities to subdivide the needles into separate groups as Well as instrumentalities to vary the number of needles in the subdivided groups for Web fashioning purposes during reciprocatory knitting, of auxiliary needle control mechanism embodying means subject to governance by end needles of the subdivided groups in selecting needles alternately at a predetermined distance from opposite end needles for special action incidental to the knittin of current courses of the fabric.

3. The combination With knitting ma chines equipped With instrumentalities to progressively decrease the number of needles by moving end needles to inactive position during oscillatory knitting, of auxiliary needle control mechanism embodying supplemental pickers subject to governance by said instrumentalities in selecting needles alternately at a predetermined distance from opposite end needles for special action during knitting of current courses of the fabric.

4. Needle control mechanism for knitting machines including in combination, pickers to fashion the knitted Web, auxiliary pickers to operate upon selected needles at predetermined distance from the ends of the fashioning series of such needles; and coordinating means determining actuation of said auxiliary pickers by the fashioning pickers.

5. Needle control mechanism for knitting machines including in combination, lifting pickers to fashion the knitted Web; auxiliary lifting pickers to operate upon selected needles at predetermined spacial distance from the respective ends of the fashioning series of such needles; and coordinating meansdetermining actuation of said auxiliary pickers by the lifting pickers.

6. Needle control mechanism for knitting machines including in combination, swivelly mounted pickers to fashion the knitted web; similarly mounted auxiliary pickers to operate upon selected needles at predetermined spacial distance from the respective ends of the fashioning series of such needles; and interposed connecting links determining actuation of said auxiliary pickers by the fashioning pickers.

7. Needle control mechanism for knitting machines including in combination, lifting pickers to fashion the Web incidentally to reciprocatory knitting upon a selected group of fashioning needles; auxiliary lifting pickers to operate upon predetermined needles of the fashioning group at equal spacial distances from the respective ends of such group; and coordinating means determining actuation of said auxiliary pickers by the lifting pickers.

8. Needle control mechanism for knitting machines including in combination lifting pickers for fashioning the knitted Web; auxiliary lifting pickers normally undertravelled by the needles; supplemental cams to elevate the needles so as to pass above said auxiliary pickers; and coordinating means determining actuation of said auxiliary pickers by the fashioning pickers to operate upon certain selected needles at predetermined equal spacial distance from the ends of the fashioning group.

9. Needle control mechanism for knitting machines including in combination lifting pickers and depressing pickers instrumental in narrowing and Widening the knitted Web during reciprocatory knitting; auxiliary pickers to operate upon predetermined needles; and coordinating means determining actuation of the auxiliary pickers by the lifting pickers to elevate selected needles, at predetermined equal spacial distance from the respective ends of the fashioning group, to tucking position for each reciprocation of the machine in readiness to be restored to the active level by the depressing picker aforesaid after remaining at the tucking position during one course of the knitting.

10. The combination with knitting machines equipped With a series of needles and instrumentalities for removing and adding end needles in fashioning a Web incidental to reciprocatory knitting, of concurrentlyoperative needle control mechanism including means capable of selecting needles alternately at a predetermined distance from the needles at opposite ends of the series for special action during knitting of current courses of the fabric.

11. The combination with knitting machines equipped with a series of needles and instrumentalities for removing and adding end needles to fashion a web incidental to reciprocatory knitting, of concurreijitlyerative needle control mechanism embodying suppiemental cam actuated auxiliary pickers capable of selecting needles at a predetermined distance from the opposite end needles for tucking action during knitting of current courses of the fabric.

12. The combination with circular stock- 77 ing knitting machines equipped with an annular series of needles as well as lllbL talities for rendering a portion of the needles idle and for progressively removing and subsequently restoring end needles of the active group in forming web pockets incidental to reciprocatory knitting, of concurrently-operative needle control mechanism including means capable of idling, for current courses of the knitting, selected needles alternately at a predetermined distance from the needles at opposite ends of the active group, thereby to form lines of demarcation parallel to the usual diagonal fashioning sutures of such web pockets.

13. The combination with seamless stocking knitting machines equipped with an annular series of needles as well as instrumentalities for raising a portion of the needles to idle or tucking level and for progressively raising and restoring end needles in forming web pockets incidental to reciprocatory knitting, of concurrently-operative needle control mechanism including auxiliary pickers capable of raising, for current courses of the knitting, selected needles alternately at a predetermined distance from the terminal needles at opposite ends of the active group, thereby to form lines of tuck stitches paralleling the usual diagonal fashioning sutures of such web pockets.

In testimony whereof, I have hereunto signed iny name at Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, this 22nd day of January, 1929.

' WYLLTER D. BUTZ. 

